We were around the same age when we married.
When I lived in a upscale suburb of a medium sized city, I was the youngest of my friends with children the same age.
Now I live in a small rural town and I am ancient as a parent and with no grandchildren. One is even gasp! not married at the elderly age of 31! 
I have a cousin who is exactly the same age as me. Her oldest is 37, mine is 33. She has 7 grandchildren!
Engaged at 6 weeks and married four years later just as soon as I graduated college. 40 plus happy years.
Timeline is long now because everyone lives together and society and parents just accept whatever you want to do. So a lot of couples live together until either a partner gets fed up with the situation/indecision or maybe kids come along which demands more stability.
We were the first of our group to get married and my dad always said “Watch–by the age of 30 all of your group will get married. The guys will grab somebody and just get married” And he was right. That was long ago but I still see that very much. You can’t stop the bio clocks from ticking. If you want kids you just cant wait forever.
Started dating sophomore year of college. Engaged senior year. Married 16 months after graduation. Had to plan and save up for wedding.
Small rural city here too. I was an old mom at 25 & 28. One of my co-workers was a grandmother at 28! Another co-worker was a grandma in her early 30s. I was team manager of younger S’ soccer team, so I had all of the birth certificates. I was just about the oldest mom there. But, I went to HS in the DC area. Of my HS classmates, I am one of the youngest moms.
I’m all for do what is best for you, but I feel the same way. Have some fun in your 20’s. And there is something to be said for learning how to be an adult outside of marriage…
I’m not sure a piece of paper (marriage license) provides more stability.
I hope none of my kids grab a spouse by 30 or so just because they are worried about their bio clock. Fully understand the bio clock but for most, 30 isn’t pushing a panic reproduction button!
I agree that more couples are living together. I personally don’t object to it. Wouldn’t have guessed I would have said that 20 years ago but now - assuming they don’t live together after a couple dates! - I am ok with it.
For my first marriage we were engaged for about a year. For my second, we were engaged for a year, but that was due to H traveling a lot of work and we were moving and wanted to wait until stuff had settled down. Most other people we know who got married/engaged around then had a year of being engaged, all due to various reasons. It seems to the same with D’s friends…S is too young.
I think that’s where our generation differs from our parents. Actually I think the older generation has changed with the passing of time also. It’s acceptable to live together, I think that when I hear of a couple not living together as the exception rather than the rule.
I’m in this camp. Been dating my boyfriend for about 6 years, and we’ve lived together for 3, but we’re in no rush to get married.
Most of my friends who’re already married are relatively religious and/or really want kids.
In no way would I advocate for anyone to take the route DH and I took, but it seemed to work out alright.
Started long distance dating/relationship spring semester junior year of college, had a ring on my finger by next fall, married in July (I wanted June, but my little sister was turning 16. Mom out the kibosh on that.), pregnant w/ first child 7 months later. I was 23 when S was born, only 3 years older than my son is now. Nope Nope Nope. We were insanely stupid! I’m sure it would’ve made me irate at the time, but I’d love to hear NOW the conversations b/w my parents. LOL
My 20 yr old has friends he knows will get married. However everyone is so unbelievably poor, w/ very few having safety nets independent of their parents.
My nephew has been w/ his wife for close to 10 years, but only got married a few years ago after they had their daughter. Asked why, they said in essence it made paperwork easier since they had the baby.
My niece has been w/ her boyfriend for something like 8 years, both make pretty decent money for fairly new college grads. Neither have any interest in getting married, though they’ve been living together since college.
I’m doing the math here, and I’m not liking the answers that I come up with.
When I had my first kid my co-worker who was the same age as me was having a grand child.
DH and I dated for over 5 years before we got married. We were both focused on our careers. I’m one of the few from my high school friend group (Eastern PA) who doesn’t have grandkids; my DD is only a rising sophomore in college. Happy for them, but hoping I don’t have grandkids for many years to come.
If you look back at you parents’ generation (or grandparents, for some of you), you’ll see some big differences also. Consider how very young Queen Elizabeth was (13, I think) when she fell in love with Philip who was five years older. She only waited until she was 21 to marry because her parents insisted.
During WW II, my mother was still a teen when she eloped with my dad who was nearly a decade older. Their engagement, such as it was, lasted less than a week between his phone call from the distant air base until she got permission from her parents and took a train to meet him. They met two years earlier but had little time together. He had to get special permission from his CO and the base chaplain. They were married over 60 years before he died.
My in-laws married right after the war. They’d known each other since she was a pre-teen, but he thought of her as his friend’s kid sister until she was 18 or so. They had a very short engagement as the Catholic Church didn’t require months of Pre Cana back then.
Also, it was still considered a scandal when babies were born to unmarried parents. My mother first became a grandmother at 42 after my oldest brother fathered a child during his senior year of college. He married his ex after the baby was born. Mother was more upset about what people might think than she was happy about having a grandchild. She lied about my brother’s wedding date for so many years that she forgot she’d changed it.
Among our other 10 siblings most engagements were long due to the requirement for Pre Cana. Some who didn’t marry in the church had long engagements while they saved for a house down payment. There were big and small weddings in both groups. Ours was considered small because the wedding was early afternoon and the reception was a buffet luncheon with lots of FL seafood and small plates instead of an elaborate sit down dinner (something my MiL didn’t like.)
We dated for three years, we were ‘engaged’ for six weeks, we’ve been married 26 years!
We met when both of us were working full time in our careers. We were in same volleyball team. We dated a year, we’re engaged for a year and had a huge wedding because his folks and my folks wanted to invite a ton of people. H had been to lots of weddings so he had to invite his friends back too. I invited the attorneys in my law firm.
I turned 29 on my 6 week honeymoon. We’ve been married 35 years.
My kids are 32 and 34. S ( age 34) has had a GF for over 5 years and has been living with her since mid-pandemic. As far as we know, D has not had any serious romantic relationships tho she has many male friends.
S is attending some weddings of friends and coworkers; D is mostly attending weddings of younger sisters of her friends. Two of her friends are engaged and May get married in 2022 or so.
Of my nieces and nephews who are in 20s and older, my older sister has all 3 of her Ds married. My younger brother has one S age 32 engaged (had to cancel gala wedding due to covid, living with GF, had dated several years). His 2nd child (D age 30) married at city hall after what seemed short romance and living together (they canceled their gala reception due to covid as well). The S age 28 has serious GF but younger D age 26 is unattached. All the other cousins aren’t seriously attached to anyone.
Well, H and I met freshman year of college, got engaged after his first year of grad school (5 hours from where I was working); got married 1 year later. First kid 5.5 years after that.
Of my kids generation, all lived together before marriage. My #1 was never formally engaged, but married almost 2.5 years after meeting, their child born after 4 years of marriage; #2 dated spouse for almost 3 years before getting engaged then lived together before getting married 2 years later - married 7+ years, no kids yet.
I have cousins who have kids who accelerated marriage plans for health insurance - no engagement, to get married name on house deed - engaged 4 months, and because ‘why wait?’ at age 38.
A grandmother at 28?! Wow! I thought being a grandmother in your 40’s was young, but 28?! I wouldn’t want to be grandmother that young…and I wouldn’t want my kids to be having kids young enough to make me a grandma at 28…
In my area it’s pretty common for people to have kids in their 30’s and 40’s, especially nowadays. In fact, it was common back in the 80’s and 90’s as well. It is an affluent area and most people want to wait until their careers are established to have kids and get married. When I taught middle school we had a lot of kids who had grandparents who passed away during the school year or had grandparents who were very elderly.
In contrast I had a colleague who had taught in a less affluent area for a while and she would have parents in their early 30’s with 3 or 4 kids or a mom who was 33 with a 13 year old. She also had a lot of grandparents who would pick up kids and these grandparents would be in their 40’s. She said it was a culture shock considering she was 30 and was unmarried and had no kids! She also said it was culture shock to come to our area and see moms in their 40’s and 50’s with middle schoolers and no grandparents picking the kids up. I guess, the more affluent you are, the more you don’t need the grandparent’s help, you can afford daycare or a nanny or you can afford to stay home. I’d say most of my younger co-workers these days are getting or got married in their late 20’s or early to mid thirties…
I also have plenty of 30 something co workers who have no kids
Yes, when we were in Lamaze, we were by far the oldest couple present. I was just 30. Most of the others were teens or in early 20s. Some were just BF/GF. One couple was the first child of the new marriage—that mom was older than me but my H was definitely the oldest guy present.
Our neighborhood and preschool was definitely more affluent and I was not youngest not oldest there, nor was H. Most of our neighbors around our age are grandparents though—we will see what the future brings.
I wouldn’t want to be a grandparent at 28–being a new mom at 30 was challenging enough.